Nancy Northup

Nancy Northup, President & CEO

Nancy Northup became President and CEO of the Center for Reproductive Rights in 2003. Under Ms. Northup’s leadership, the Center’s game changing litigation work—combined with its unparalleled expertise in the use of constitutional, international, and comparative human rights law—have transformed how reproductive rights are understood by courts, governments, and human rights bodies.

She has led the organization’s exceptional growth: tripling its operating budget over the course of a decade; opening four overseas offices; conceiving and implementing its strategic focus on ensuring reproductive health and freedom as a fundamental human right; and establishing the Center as an international resource for litigation strategy and innovation.

She was previously the founding director of the Democracy Program at the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU School of Law; a prosecutor and Deputy Chief of Appeals in the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York; and a law clerk to the Honorable Alvin B. Rubin of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. She has taught human rights and constitutional law as an adjunct professor at NYU Law School and Columbia Law School and appears frequently in leading media and press. She is a graduate of Brown University and Columbia Law School, where she was a Kent Scholar and Managing Editor of the Columbia Law Review. (New York, NY)